


The Way Out Is Through

by ellebelle9



Category: American Horror Story, American Horror Story: Apocalypse
Genre: Anxiety, F/M, High School AU, Past Suicide Attempt, Satanism, Self-Harm, Suicidal Ideation, anxious!mallory, depressed!mallory, oh god I'm really doing a HS AU, so please take care, some major depression/anxiety themes, wow these tags are fun
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2019-10-28 03:56:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17780114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellebelle9/pseuds/ellebelle9
Summary: There’s a boy about her age on the couch across from her. In Mallory’s anxiety she’d barely taken note of her surroundings after checking in until the silence of the waiting room shrouds them. There’s only the two of them and he’s not looking at a magazine or his phone. He’s looking at her.(High School/Therapy AU)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **I know I'm not finished Sunspots bc I'm a disaster human being but ya this is here ******
> 
> ****credit to my beta shieroello29 xx ********

There’s a boy about her age on the couch across from her. In Mallory’s anxiety she’d barely taken note of her surroundings after checking in until the silence of the waiting room shrouds them. There’s only the two of them and he’s not looking at a magazine or his phone. He’s looking at her.

She gives a nervous, defusing little smile and fidgets with her fingernails to avoid his intense stare. It's all Mallory can do not to flee, to make it this far despite her anxiety about the clinic and the lump in her throat that sticks when she tries to swallow. Waiting room etiquette and all, what did it matter that she was in therapy, he must be too. She thinks it must be her uniform. The hideous poly-cotton blend - white and blue polo and the navy skirt that marks her as from Robichaux, the state school. The public funded. The poor.

Blonde hair brushes the collar of his Hawthorne suit, the nightmarishly strict school in the nice part of town. The school that has the kind of kids whose parents pay their therapy bills with spare change. It turns her stomach to feel his acute derision aimed at her.

A fan turns too slowly overhead and Mallory sweats through the back of her shirt trying not to feel intimidated. When the phone at reception shrills it jerks her head up instinctively. Heart stammering, she meets those eyes again at the same time the doctor leans out and calls his name.

“Michael.”

The boy blinks and rises, towering above her. He buttons his blazer slowly and leaves without another glance. Suddenly the air rushes back into the room. Mallory discreetly wipes the cold sweat from the back of her neck. Minutes later Dr. Goode calls her through and Mallory has a whole different kind of anxiety overcome her.

X

The problems focusing in class are relatively new. Mallory’s never been the most stellar student, not by a long shot. But a passing mark was what she could maintain until she hit the second term of eleventh grade.

“ _Are you worried about the future, Mallory?”_ Dr. Goode had asked in that kind, tempered voice.

The question made Mallory smile self-depreciatingly, unable to answer at the time. Because truly she was worried about everything, but ahead of her the future loomed like a great, black void.

She’s bouncing her foot restlessly under her desk in the last minutes of the school day. Ms. Snow packs away her own things and the other students are just as restless, ready to bolt. Mallory hadn’t even unzipped her pencil case the entire lesson and not a single soul had noticed, secured away as she was at the back of class.

“ _What’s holding you back from doing your work?”_ Dr. Goode had asked.

“ _I guess I don’t find it interesting anymore_.” She had deflected, though thinking privately, _I can’t make myself care._

The bell sounds and Mallory is last, slinking out even after the teacher, shouldering her bag and making for the exit.

Less than half a week before Dr. Goode has another chance to fix her. It only irked Mallory a little when her carer had suggested she try therapy. At this point she’s apathetic enough to try anything, to try and stop the feeling like the earth might swallow her whole.

Late that night, eyes burning from the lamplight, Mallory remembers that blonde boy’s stare and pretends a chill doesn’t run through her.

X

Coco calls it _millennial depression_ , and sometimes her friend is the only one who makes her feel normal and accepted. They meet up before school every day for coffee that they drink on the steps to the art room. Coco’s unafraid of joking about it unlike Mallory’s carer who treats the subject like it’s dangerous, like she might _infect_ her.

It’s Coco who understands because _‘literally every single teenager is going through this, Mal. You’re not special.’_

Usually it helps to laugh it off, but it doesn’t change the fact that the loneliness she feels knows no discernible depth. It goes on and on. It’s eating her alive and not even Coco’s warm company can help.

Dr. Goode is alright so far, two sessions in and all Mallory understands about her is that she’s elegant and endlessly patient. And all Mallory has learnt about herself is that she’s unarticulated and too quiet, repeating most of her sentences until the doctor gives up and sits beside her on the couch rather than across the room.  It’s actually better that way, without the pressure of maintaining direct eye contact. Her sessions are on Tuesday afternoons and Mallory makes her way to the clinic, taking the bus from the school to the city outskirts.

One foot on the stairs and she can see the silhouette of the mysterious boy. _Michael_ , her memory supplies. Already she feels anxiety bloom familiar in her gut but now that the receptionist has seen her it would be weirder to turn around.

Mallory pushes through, checks in at reception and has a conundrum on where to sit.

Those blue eyes have followed her from the moment she stepped into the building and Mallory meets them hesitantly, trying not to be scared off. Sensing her hesitation, his hand gestures to the armchair beside him. A safe enough distance away but Mallory doesn’t know if she should be affronted that he would tell her where to sit, or grateful.

She has to sit down, her legs are shaking, and before she knows it Mallory’s sitting level with him.

Now that she feels equal to stare she’s can't help it. The boy is stupidly handsome and the dryness in her throat is not due to the heat of the room. He holds out a hand for her to shake and introduces himself.

“Michael Langdon.”

Oh and he even talks smoothly like the well-groomed private school boy he is. Something about him sets her teeth on edge despite herself.

“My hands are clammy.” She says as she takes his hand. He blinks at this statement, clearly having expected a name. A beat passes and she steals her hand back, already too awkward to save the moment and actually introduce herself. Silence follows and this time he looks away, running a hand through his hair – the only tell that he’s given that he might be nervous as well. She doesn’t have time to feel gratified before his doctor is calling him away again.

“I’ll see you next time.” It’s almost a question.

“Yeah, see you.” Mallory says with a nervous smile.

Michael swings his fancy leather bag up onto his shoulder and a small book falls from the motion. It hits the carpet with a little thunk but he doesn’t notice, already halfway down the hall before Mallory’s brain even registers it.

“Wait,” she says too quietly, too late. Hand already reaching for it and halfway out of her seat before she realises he’s disappeared already. Mallory clutches it to her chest and settles back, unsure of whether or not to put it on the table, give it to reception, or… the tiny, stupid voice in her head says… _keep it._

And when she sees the cover she _flinches._ Embossed in the black leather is Baphomet staring up at her, that sinister head framed in a pentagram. 

And then Dr. Goode is calling her name and Mallory presses the book to her breast guilty. She discreetly slips it into her bag, heart pounding.

Every stereotype she applied to Michael Langdon is wiped out in a second.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **do y'all want more? ******


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **thank y'all for the feedback, you warm my cold, dead heart xx**
> 
> **credit to the best beta ever ever ever shieroello29 ******

Mallory doesn’t know what to do with the book.

There’s a constant thought nagging at her to just get rid of it, throw it away and remove the evidence that she technically stole the boy’s property. But part of her wants to keep it. It’s such an odd thing to have, and though she’s only had the bravery to flick through a couple of pages there’s something magnetic about it.

And then she could always return it to him. She tries to imagine how that conversation might go.

_Hi, I accidentally picked up your devil-worshipping book. Would you like it back, or should I go jump in front of a bus?_

Mallory isn’t good at talking to people, and so for a whole week she hides that book in the tiny space against the wall behind her bedside table, mortified at herself and dreading her next therapy session when she might have to face Michael. Her carer Ms Venable is a devout Christian and would surely throw Mallory into the streets if she found the Satanic bible in her ward’s room. Like her parents had thrown her away, Mallory can’t dismiss the thought that she is very much disposable to the people who look after her.

It makes for a stressful state of being, more than usual.

In the hidden zip of her bag she smuggles the book to school and covertly shows Coco on the stairs in the morning.

“Holy fucking shit, Mallory! Are you joining a cult?” She whisper-shouts, nearly spilling her frappucino on Mallory’s last clean skirt.

“No, Coco! Oh my god.” She inches away, already hiding the book back in the safety of her bag, shoving it away guiltily like she’d been caught with drugs rather than some controversial reading material. “I found it. I don’t know what to do with it.”

“Put that thing back where it came from or so help me!” Coco’s horrified face is so comical it’s almost funny except that Mallory’s desperately trying not to attract attention.

“I can’t! It’s not mine!”

“You stole it? This is getting worse by the second.” Mallory shushes her friend, going red in the face with mortification as some nearby students start to look over.

“Please be quiet!” Mallory’s chest is starting to constrict, a familiar feeling that attacks her near daily and luckily Coco’s known her long enough to back off and give her a minute to breathe. “I’m sorry, I just don’t need the whole world knowing about this.”

“Does Ms Venable know you have that?”

“Of course not.”

“But why do you have it? Are you seriously reading it?” They both stand when the bell rings and Mallory lifts her school bag gingerly like the book is going to leap out and bite her.

“A boy at therapy dropped it and I didn’t get the chance to return it to him, and now it’s too late. I don’t know if I should give it back. His initials are on the front page, it might be important to him.”

“Honey, he’s a fucking Satanist. No wonder he’s in therapy. Yikes, what a weirdo.”

“Thanks, Coco.”

“Ugh, you know what I mean!” She knocks her shoulder into Mallory’s until she smiles. Then more seriously, “I’d throw it away if I were you. Pretend you never saw it.”

Mallory considers it over the course of the day and agonises over the presumably awkward interaction returning the book might involve. She’s almost ready to pass out from the crippling indecision once she gets off the bus that afternoon only to find the waiting room empty. Her relief is reinforced by her anxiety and she collapses into the armchair like she’s run a marathon.

Her session is too long. Dr Goode feels immediately that there’s something off with Mallory and niggles at her, trying to find a way in through her tightly guarded walls. Mallory shifts and deflects and eventually becomes so withdrawn that she just stops speaking altogether. Dr Goode sighs disappointedly and for the last twenty minutes takes out a colouring book that they both work on at the coffee table in the middle.

With her psychologist sitting on the floor across from her and the only sound between them the scratching of pencils, Mallory finds a small sliver of peace.

X

That evening Ms Venable leaves dinner for her in the fridge. She is not a kind woman, often highly critical, blunt, and suspicious. But for her faults she does make sure Mallory is fed, and had organised government-funded therapy for her charge when her moods became so terrible that it was near impossible to get her out of bed in the mornings.

It’s not that things have necessarily gotten better for Mallory, most days she would much prefer to just not exist anymore. It’s fairly exhausting waking up as the same person every day.

But what choice does she have. There’s that great, dark future looming ahead and each day she plummets further into the unknown, guided only by the educational system’s ideals and the push and pull of authorities wanting ' _what's best for her'_. Coco wants to do something in beauty or fashion and this future fits so neatly into her stable identity, so easily.

 _'Hi, I’m Coco, and I want to be a fashion designer'_. It rolls out of her so fast, like it's always been there at the back of her tongue.

 _'Hi, I’m Mallory, and I want to die'._ She'd said something along the lines of this to the school officer a couple months beforehand in the decide-your-future-in-an-instant afternoon, and thus spurred the phone call home, the tearful confessions to her carer, the therapy sessions. Michael, and his fucking Satanic bible, that’s weighing heavy in her bag, nestled against her lower back like a hand.

X

Tuesday is coming too soon and Mallory tries to beg off going.

“I don’t think it’s working for me.” She says in her tiny voice over afternoon tea – meticulously made finger sandwiches served with a sharp black tea.

Ms Venable blinks at her from across the table, looking perfectly put together in her usual royal purple and severe up-do.

“When was the last time you took a shower without me having to remind you?”

Mallory feels shame cut through her entire being. Immediately, she wishes she could reverse time and take back the words to prevent the admonishment that is sure to come. If only the earth could swallow her whole right now. Ms Venable does not pull any punches.

“You’ve been wearing the same skirt for the past week because you haven’t put away your washing, you barely eat unless I sit you down and make you, and I’ve caught you staring into space three times since we sat down. I don’t even want to imagine how much sleep you’re getting, or not getting, judging by the bags under your eyes.”

Tears start to come and Mallory blinks rapidly to stave them off. Criticism like this never helps; it just makes her feel worse. But Ms Venable knows exactly how to hurt with a few harsh words and some good aim.

She leans menacingly over the table.

“I’ve organised these sessions with Dr Goode for your own benefit. You should – no, you _will_ be attending them, and someday you might even show a little gratitude for my efforts.” She punctuates this by clipping her teacup down loudly into its saucer and  Mallory feels a tear betray her.

“I’m sorry, Ms Venable. I am very grateful.” She hurries to reassure her even though she can’t raise her eyes from her hands. “I just didn’t want to waste Dr Goode’s time.”

“Then don’t waste mine.” She says, leaving Mallory at the table with her bitter tears and cold tea.

X

The boy is there again when Mallory slumps through the door, drained completely of energy after a stressful school day, her mood already soured by the conversation yesterday with Ms Venable and apathy settling over her like a protective shroud.

All this angst over his stupid fucking book. She should have just thrown it in the bin and burned it for good measure, not fetched it from the floor like an obedient dog and keeping it for two whole weeks. He should learn how to zip his fucking bag.

These thoughts congeal in her head until her anger becomes something solid she’s going to hurl at him if he dares even look at her funny. Mallory checks in at the reception desk, going blank at Zoe’s niceties and taking her seat as directed, ignoring Michael’s expectant look to take the armchair he offered her last time. Turns out she’s spiteful when she feels a lack of significant consequence.

Michael offers her a kind smile in greeting and that dark shield falters a bit, cracks blooming down the centre and her displaced anger dissolves quickly into guilt.

_He doesn’t even know me, and I certainly don’t know him._

She gives herself whiplash with her mood swings. Mallory tries to smile back but it’s probably more of a grimace. The clock ticks closer to four when they both have their appointments scheduled and they spend the time in mutual silence, flicking glances at each other. She feels too raw to speak.

But then as his doctor calls out for him a sense of urgency seizes her and just as he rises to stand she whispers, the words falling gently at his feet like little stones.

“I have your book.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **gonna gloss right over the fact that Venable and Cordelia have the same face............ ******  
>  **(Gallant and Tate can exist in the same universe and Michael ain't shook so neither am I OKAY) ******
> 
> **I love each and every one of you pls let me know you like this even a little xx ******  
>   
> 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Trigger warning for discussion of self-harm, suicide attempts and suicidal ideation  
> **   
>  **Please take care ******

He’s half-risen from his seat when the strange girl says to him.

“I have your book.”

The whole world comes crashing to a halt. His first thought being _what the fuck_ followed so closely by… _oh no_.

She must catch the fear in his eyes, looking bizarrely self-assured as if she had needed to level the field between them.

Michael straightens when he realises Dr Day is still waiting for him, unable to pull his eyes away from the girl for another long moment. She has such beautiful brown eyes that stare him down until he damn well feels shaken to the core.

_Please_. He desperately tries to convey with his eyes. He doesn’t even know what he wants her to do. _Don’t throw it away. Don’t tell anybody. Don’t hate me._

Instead he leaves her behind with his secrets as if he’d hollowed himself out right there in the waiting room. Scooped his guts from his chest and left them on the table for her scrutiny and criticism. He prays to his dark lord that he might catch her after his session. One long hour to go.

Michael’s seen several psychologists in his lifetime and told each of them a different secret, a scattered trail of breadcrumbs from his past that might someday add up to a whole image if collated.

To one he tells of his mother’s hatred, her disgust, thinking him some putrid creature, born under a bad sign and nothing but waste. To another he laments his step-father’s rejection, love given only conditionally until he had inevitably disappointed him.

His grandmother comes up to all of them. Hard to gloss over the event that created the monster he is now. When he was kicked out to live on the streets, nearly killed in an accident that left him crippled. His leg hasn’t been the same ever since, and his anger has grown thrice more volatile.

Dr Day gets to hear of his latest habits though. Michael speaks of his sister Violet who indirectly taught him the best trick of all. She doesn’t know that he had seen her scars once. Had interrogated her boyfriend Tate as to what they were from.

Tate had lifted his own sleeve to show his own. Those fathomless, condescending eyes staring him down until Michael blinked away, shamed somehow.

“… When you’ve truly hit bottom, this is the way out.” He’d said.

And thus started an obsession a few years later. He had been at one of the Church’s functions, hosted by the honourable Father LaVey. Michael had been dressed nicely, presentable always as Ms Mead’s pet. Her _project_. Her fucking rescue dog scraped off the streets and nursed back to health, implanted with gloriously taboo ideas and let loose on the world. He’d lifted a shiny little razor from a box on the sink in the bathroom, exploring when he’d been bored by the shoulder-rubbing with other Satanists who wanted to coo over his baby-blonde hair. Curiously dragged it over the soft skin of his ankle and relished the drying blood on his skin, sticking to his sock for the rest of the night, stolen razor nestled carefully in his pocket.

Ms Mead knows about the cutting, found out quickly because he was sloppy to hide it. Throwing blood-stained rags in the wash thinking he was discreet, leaving puddles of blood near the basin. She has never contested it. Calls it an old practice, sometimes speaks about history’s perspective on the act. That it is cleansing, even worshipping. The human need to self-destruct is fascinating to her.

Dr Day is also riveted by his ladders, an interesting collection, neatly chaotic and distinctly varied along the lengths of his limbs. He rolls up his sleeve in conjunction with a day he would be telling her about, pointing to a mass of scar tissue.

_This was from my first day of high school._

_A couple months ago, I had this really bad date._

_Was left home alone for a weekend. Took hours to stop the bleeding._

_Yesterday. I was bored._

_My last suicide attempt_.

Sometimes talking about it is cathartic and other times it’s agonising. The overture of Ms Mead’s influence reminds him there’s one last big secret he can’t dare spill.

The reason he carried around that fucking book.

Why that pretty girl from the waiting room probably thinks he’s a freak. Absolutely depraved, a lunatic, _crazy_.

But given where they met, there’s a good chance she might meet him halfway on that last one. He suffers through the appointment, too anxious to sit still. Jiggling his leg up and down and ignoring Dr Day’s leading questions. She asks him if he was still thinking about hurting himself and he downright _laughed_. It’s probably rude, but he’s allowed to have one bad day. It will give her something to bring up in their next session apart from trying to tease apart his reasons for cutting a massive line up each arm three weeks ago.

Ms Mead had put him in therapy because of the suicide attempt. At first he thought he'd scared her, that the novelty had worn off, and the amount of blood she'd had to clean up... He's since realised this was a punishment. 

And now It’s everyone’s favourite topic.  _Why did Michael do this?_

Even now as he nearly storms out of the room when Dr Day finally gives up, the scar tissue itches at the edges, reminding him of his stupid mistake, reminding him he’s still alive.

What relief, what torture.

Outside the office he paces nervously, watching the steely clouds turn duller, second guessing himself. She may have left already.

He doesn’t _normally_ carry his bible around casually. Definitely won’t again after he was stupid enough to lose it. If Father LaVey finds out he will be skinned alive. He’s not ashamed of his faith, in fact it’s brought him greater guidance than any of his parental figures throughout his life. But he’s seen the media, he’s not stupid. There’s no good way of bringing it up even to someone like Dr Day who claims that he may ‘ _speak freely in this safe space._ There are few safe spaces for Satanism in America and his congregation is one.

And thus the great confliction that landed him here. Bookmarked and underlined bible tucked into his school bag to prepare for his first speech that evening for Father LaVey. On the merits of apocalypse, the biggest cleansing of all.

It is his Communion equivalent, it will raise him above the cattle. He will become Unholy.

Or so he’s been fed. Ms Mead has no doubt mentioned covertly his ‘accident’, and tonight will be another kind of interrogation.

Just as Michael’s fingers start shaking the girl comes down the stairs slowly, eyeing him like he might attack her. The first drops of rain begin to fall and she reaches into her bag and takes the book out, holding it in her hand.

He takes a step closer and sees something shutter inside of her, so he stays very still.

“I never caught your name.” He broaches carefully.

“I never gave it.” She swallows. “I’m Mallory.”

He makes a weak gesture towards the book, blinking back a raindrop that falls from his brow.

“I’m sorry you had to see that… “It’s…” He doesn’t have words to explain it, shouldn’t need to yet he feels compelled. He’s spent years trying not to feel ashamed of his faith, struggling with doubt and righteous anger like any teenager and it only takes her carefully blank face to have him feeling so incredibly _lost_.

Mallory steps closer and extends the book, the leather cover catching the rain. He watches a drop slide off the spine before his limbs catch up to his brain and he takes it from her, breathing a small sigh of relief.

“Weird hobby.” She says with a small smile, dismissive as she tries to move past him.

“It’s not.” He starts, turning to follow her trajectory. “Not a hobby. I mean…”

Her thin white shirt is turning transparent in the rain and he tears his eyes up, fighting the blush that comes to his face anyway.

“It’s important to me.” He whispers to her. “Thank you for returning it.”

She turns again, to move down the path and reach the road and he can’t help himself again, words coming unbidden.

“Why do you come here?”

She freezes, arms coming across her chest to keep the warmth in as the rain starts falling harder. He can see her turning over answers in her head. He braces himself for something defensive.

_Why does anyone? None of your fucking business. Why are YOU here?_

Instead she takes a deep breath and starts to say something but stops, swallows, and instead,

“Sometimes I just wish…”

He blinks and the moment passes, washed away with the rain.

“What?”

“I just wish… I knew who I was supposed to be.”

Hours later he’d agonise over what he could have said before she turned away and disappeared out on the street. He wants to tell her he feels the same way, that they’re too young to know, that she’s not alone in this.

He's good at preparation, planning, and he has six days until he sees her again. 


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **do I have any idea what I'm doing? no **  
> **  
>  **do I persist anyway bc I love you? yes ********

Michael wakes most mornings with agony in his leg. Spurs tightening along the femur and cinching, tensing the muscles and releasing them like wringing a hand along a rag.

He wakes exhausted, angry and near tears. The pain-relief pills have moved closer, from the bathroom to his desk to his bedside. They are swallowed down with dusty water and heavy breaths. And eventually he moves, feeling awfully heavy and worn through before the day has even begun.

There are days he doesn’t make it out of bed at all. Depending on the mood du jour, this could be a good thing or a bad thing.

As he makes his way downstairs he remembers last night’s conversation with Father LaVey to distract him from the stiffness in his knee.

LaVey had liked the passages he picked out, and the essay Michael formed around the benefits of apocalypse, but with a sharp tongue he’d spiked critical holes through his argument until Michael is left wondering what sense he had written at all.

_You must convince the Illuminati of the merits of your plan. Your leftover humans may survive the nuclear winters. How long will your outposts last before your ‘Sanctuary’ is built?_

It’s worse than high school, there's no grade and the consequences of failing this test are unknown. Much like Christianity or what he imagines of it, much of their faith is balanced on the head of a pin. Ms Mead slides a plate in front of him with a sharp clap and Michael jumps in his seat.

‘Your hair needs brushing.’ She hands over a knife and fork. ‘And you forgot to iron your uniforms last night.’

‘I know. I got in late.’ He says redundantly, as if she didn’t know about his meeting.

‘And?’ The heaviness in his bones sinks a little deeper. He deliberately misses her prompt and her mouth tightens. ‘What did he think of the plan?’

He explains as best he can, the criticism that tore his careful structure to pieces, trying not to let too much anguish seep into his words.

Ms Mead folds her hands and rests her chin upon them when he finishes, looking heavenward in irony as if asking for patience.

‘Did he ask you about your arms?’ She asks casually, like it was an afterthought. Michael flinches again and automatically tugs his sleeves down further, grasping the cuffs in his hands and swallowing nervously. ‘Michael?’

‘He, uh… yeah. He brought it up.’

The hair on the back of his neck is standing up and the whole conversation has his lizard brain screaming _run._ Her smile is dangerous.

‘Hmm.’ Is all she says before she turns back to tidying the breakfast dishes. Just as he pads to the edge of the room to make a quiet escape she speaks again. ‘Did he have a solution for you?’

He can’t disguise the trembling that shivers down his forearms. Cold sweat stains the back of his shirt.

‘Yes, he did.’

x

Mallory has been crying on and off through English for the stupidest reason. Coco keeps nudging her foot under the desk trying to meet her eyes but she stares resolutely ahead, pretending to be very invested in the Lord of the Flies presentation even as tears leak down her face in the dark room.

It was all because of a stupid bird. The silly thing had flown straight into the closed window of their science classroom, making many of the girls scream aloud. Mallory had looked right into its eyes on its impact before it slid down the glass and landed with a soft thump in the garden bed below.

‘It’s alright girls,’ the teacher had raised her voice above the commotion, ‘it’s probably just stunned. Can we _please_ get back to this, if that’s not too much to ask?’

Still the scare had entertained them for the rest of the lesson. Mallory especially, whose head had been nearly pressed against the glass as she stared down at the twitching creature dying in the dirt.

If she was a braver person she would have rushed out of the room, circled the building to take the creature into her hands. If it couldn’t be saved maybe she could have at least put it in the sun so it could die warm. She imagines a scenario where she is powerful enough to bring it back to health but that fantasy is just out of reach, kept in the privacy of her mind where only she will see it. And there’s still the glass between her and the bird and that is when she begins to cry.

x

On Sunday morning Michael can still smell disinfectant faintly from cleaning his new wounds the night before. He keeps his hand on his bag as he walks, paranoid now of losing his books even with the zipper closed. A cold sun brightens the streets but he still feels the ache in his bad leg which shudders with every step. He’s preoccupied with not falling over, not scratching healing scabs and he doesn’t see her until she stops in front of him.

Mallory looks angelic in her white dress, an entirely different creature from her garish school uniform. He feels the knot of his tie against his throat when he swallows. She looks as tired as he feels.

It takes him a moment to speak and she blinks expectantly.

‘Hey’.

‘Hello.’

‘Where are you going?’ He asks, as if he has any business knowing. God he’s stupid. He couldn’t just ask how she was, talk about the fucking weather instead.

‘Uh, church.’ She looks down self-consciously at her demure little dress. She glances over her shoulder as if waiting for someone to catch up but the street is empty. ‘What about you?’

Michael can’t very well say he’s headed to his Satanic cult so he settles on the closest thing.

‘Yeah, same. Church…’

There’s an awkward moment where they both realise they’re heading in different directions, a memory of that incriminating book and he shifts his weight.

‘Are you alright?’ Mallory asks, genuinely. Those big eyes blinking up at him making him ache in a whole new way. ‘Your leg…’

He’s lucky it doesn’t buckle underneath him, the way he limps a step closer.

‘It’s an old injury.’ He says, only half a lie. She nods and takes a deep breath, preparing for the words that will enable them both to socially escape in one piece.

‘Well… I should keep going. Um. Have a nice day?’ She says it like a question and she cringes as she does but it makes him smile.

‘You too. I’ll see you in the waiting room.’

The mention of it has her smile tightening and she leaves him there on the street. He watches the swish of her dress until she turns the corner. He’s breathing hard suddenly, like he’d just run a mile and his leg is aching much the same.

x

Things have gotten worse since the bird died outside the window. It has become something of a hyperfixation to Mallory. Ms Venable thinks it is a good thing, persuading Mallory to look into veterinary studies for her post-school career.

‘There’s a very good course here.’ She says, handing her a stack of brochures and tapping the one on top. Mallory can’t help but think she has widely missed the point.

And to make matters worse she insists Mallory comes with her to church the next morning. Ms Venable disappears into the confession booth at the end of the service, instructing Mallory to wait for her amongst the churning crowd. There's too many polite greetings, too much small talk, the man who eyes her expectantly, making an ushering motion towards an empty confessional when he mistakes her waiting for the wrong reason. The air suddenly vanishes from the room and Mallory gasps, black spots dancing in her vision, shaking her head, escaping to huddle in an empty stairwell and hoping she won’t pass out or throw up.

The idea of confession is both compelling and repulsive to her. It’s a bit too much like the idea of therapy for her, where you confess your secrets and you are saved. Yet no matter how grievous she thinks her sins, there is always some kind of remedy. She wonders what the Father would say if she told him she keeps thinking of a boy. A boy with long, golden hair and who carries a book about the devil with him. A book that at one time she too carried.

She wonders how far she could push until they decreed her beyond saving. She wonders what Michael’s ‘church’ is like and her head spins a little more.

During the week she keeps track of what she should tell Dr Goode. Makes little sentence reminders in her phone of the things that can keep them occupied for their hour sessions. They will spend at least twenty minutes dissecting the panic attack at church if she mentions it. Mallory is perhaps more cunning that she gives herself credit, always skirting around the real issues with carefully placed stories.

She has her list and sometimes it helps. She likes being prepared, and above all she's a  _good girl_. The older ladies at the church tell her this, pressing cold, perfumed hands to her cheeks like she was a pretty doll. It’s what her mother called her once, in a faded memory that sings in her mind.

But a few days later when she sees Michael waiting on the steps of the doctor’s office for her, one hand braced on his bad leg and a devastating smile shooting her down, Mallory breathes deeply and throws it all away.

He meets her halfway down the path. They both miss their appointments.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **... what if I just... ended it here... **  
> **  
>  **jk there might be one more ********


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **disclaimer: I am not religious and I have little experience with churches (especially satanic ones lol) so please take everything with a nice grain of salty author's ignorance **  
>  **I also know little about foster care especially in the states. I'm wildly brazen at pretending I know american things **  
>  **thanks to shieroell029 for inspiring the sweetness in this chapter x **************

Mallory slows her pace deliberately so Michael can keep up with his bad leg. He had taken her hand and they had run down the pathway from the doctor’s office like they were truanting school, giggling like the nice ladies were going to chase them down. They leaned together against a shopfront a block away and caught their breath. She became suddenly conscious of the clamminess of her hand and untangled it from his. She shifted her bag on her shoulder and looked up to find Michael grinning widely at her.

But since then he’s been limping a little worse and Mallory can’t shut off that stupid voice in her head that worries too much. They shouldn’t have run. She should have been more considerate. But she’s too shy to say anything and doesn’t want to embarrass Michael, but she’s conscious of every step they take down the main avenue of town that he might be in pain.

Mallory tries to be subtle. Directing him into a secondhand shop, and a bookshop afterwards. They spend a little time in each, stepping around each other awkwardly. It’s exhilarating just being in his space, savouring the little details she picks up about his opinions, clothing tastes, the way he politely steps around other customers, the gentle hand he touches to her elbow to bring her closer to look at something.

They drop small facts about each other into the small talk.

‘When did you move here?’ _A few years ago._

‘What’s that school like? Do they really make you wear long socks with shorts in summer?’ _Unfortunately._

‘I hate the weather here.’ _Too hot in the summer, I agree._

‘I’ve read this book at least ten times.’ _What did you like so much about it?_

‘I’m in foster care.’ She tells Michael when he jokes about the oppressive nature of parents. Immediately she jolts, normally she doesn’t give herself away so easily. There’s something about the way he asks her questions, the way he looks at her like he is trying so hard to see past all the little walls she puts up. He wants to get inside and she wants to let him.

Michael snaps his head up at the information and she tries to fight the usual shame that comes with that confession. But then he does something odd. Michael reaches for her hand and grasps it quickly, letting go as soon as possible so she’s left guessing if it really happened.

‘I’m adopted. But I’ve lived with Ms Mead so long it doesn’t even feel like it.’

‘That sounds nice.’ Mallory says genuinely. 'Is she good to you?'

The question catches him off guard given the way his eyes shutter briefly.

'Yes. In her own way.'

They’re out of the street again and she spies a shop behind his shoulder and the smile growing on her face has Michael turning around, puzzled. She’s happy for the distraction so they might step out of the dangerous territory of talking about their home lives.

‘Oh no.’

‘It’s hot out!’ She justifies, though it’s the sticky, rich heat of another coming rainstorm. Mallory thinks about taking his hand like he did but can’t work up the nerve, trusting that he will follow her inside the ice cream parlour. She thinks he needs to rest his leg, and that he must be awfully hot in his school blazer he has not taken off.

Inside it is cool and quiet and the glass case is shining invitingly. Michael sets his jaw but follows her over and looks down at the flavours.

‘You seem like a rainbow bubblegum kind of guy.’ She teases, watching his eyes flick to her and narrow.

‘You’re cheeky.’ Michael admonishes her with a smile, showing all his sharp teeth. He lifts his chin regally as he moves down the display, hands held behind his back until he’s finished inspecting the selection, almost catching her staring at his profile.

They take their desserts to the riverfront and relish the end of the weakening afternoon sun. Halfway through her coconut gelato she sees he is not enjoying the cinnamon as much as he should.

It’s so brave of her, what she does next. Mallory doesn’t know where it comes from. Something about the whole afternoon has taken the weight off that she usually lives with inside of her, like she has dropped a heavy cloak from her shoulders and can walk freely. She feels so, so light. It makes it easy to let the words fall from her tongue.

‘Do you want to swap?’

Michael does a double take, eyes flicking between her lips and the extended cone. He wordlessly hands his over.

Mallory’s heart nearly stammers out of her chest when she takes a mouthful of the spicy-sweet cinnamon that he had previously been licking. Michael hides his red face behind the fall of his blonde hair and they both pretend to be very interested in the light reflecting off the water.

‘What is your church like?’ He asks, she watches him lick a stray droplet of melting ice cream from his wrist and something snaps warmly in Mallory’s abdomen in response. It takes her a beat too long to reply.

‘Uh, like any church I guess…’ She trails off, biting into the cone. Trying to eat elegantly, speak loudly enough and not make a complete fool of herself is proving to be a delicate feat.

The confusion that passes through his eyes sparks a thought in her that grows like a flame.

‘Have you never been to a… church?’ She asks incredulously. ‘You live in America.’

‘I’ve not been to a Christian church, no.’

What he is insinuating starts to fall into place. Mallory turns so she faces him directly, speaking lower.

‘What is yours like?’

There’s only a short moment of hesitation before he speaks, words just above a whisper.

‘Violent.’

It sends Mallory reeling back like he had struck her. Michael blinks and hurries to explain.

‘It's not anything too terrible.' He lies. 'We have rituals and ceremonies, like any religion I suppose. Things that we... sacrifice... for revelations, to seek guidance, that sort of thing. There's all these rules, which is hypocritical given that it’s supposed to be about freedom and free will.’ His ice cream is dripping onto the ground but he’s caught up in his head, trying to put the emotions and doubts he feels into truthful words without scaring her further. ‘They have been kind to me, welcoming. But sometimes I wonder...’

Mallory feels a little too much like a rabbit caught in a trap, hanging onto his words with a rapid heartbeat, catching a glimpse into a darker world. A shiver passes over Michael and he meets her eyes again, lingering there as if coming back from the brink of some great confession.

‘I wonder what the point of it all is.’ He finishes lamely. Shaking off the last of the spell and cleaning his hand with sharp, angry swipes of his napkin.

Mallory sits back frowning, and tries to reel the conversation back to something safer.

‘A Christian church sounds similar... I suppose.' She hates the way she stutters out her response. 'There are too many rules, too many exceptions to those rules, and an empty promise at the end of it all.’ It scares her in a good way to speak so candidly though, to speak her mind on things that Ms Venable would skin her alive for.

‘Did you read it?’ Michael asks.

‘What?’

‘The book. When I dropped it. You had it for a while…’

‘Oh! No, not really.’ She blushes, hoping he isn’t disappointed with the answer she gives. ‘I saw that it was marked, that you had initialled it. I wanted to throw it away at first because it was stressful keeping it in the house. Ms Venable, my carer, she’s _very_ religious. Christian, I mean. I was scared of what she would do if she found out I had it.’

‘So why didn’t you?’ He leans in close. ‘Why didn’t you throw it away?’

The clouds have entirely swallowed the sun and the shadows grow longer until they’re nearly consumed in them. His golden hair glints beside her and the encroaching darkness makes it easier to speak these secrets aloud.

‘I don’t know. It looked important. I wanted to see…’

‘See what?’

‘What would happen.’

‘Do you like that, Mallory?’ Michael leans in closer, voice growing ever softer and his scent filling up the space between them. ‘Looking for my reaction? What I would have said or done to get my bible back?' He’s leaning in so close and his eyes are fathomless. 'Did you like being in control?’

That awful weight comes plummeting back and fear strikes down Mallory's spine, making her lurch backwards. Familiar black spots dance in her vision and she feels her breath come short. Something about the idea of it, what she had done by keeping that book, that she had been doing it for control strikes too true. The blow glances off her psyche and panic replaces her sense. Mallory had wanted to see what would happen, what holding that secret above a stranger's head would be like, what he would do to get it back. It’s all true and he saw too deeply into her.

‘I’m… I’m not, I mean… I don’t…’ She’s rushing to get away, clawing her bag up from the ground and slinging it on her shoulder. ‘I have to go.’

‘Did I say something wrong?’ Michael asks, looking up at her, puzzled. Maybe even a little hurt. Her heart is trying to take off through her ribs and her eyes can’t land on his face long enough to see. ‘I’m sorry, Mallie. I didn’t mean to scare you. I didn't _want_ to scare you.’

‘Thank you for the… thank you.’ Mallory says, turning on her heel and walking as fast as her legs can take her. Leaving him behind once again.

Five minutes later she’s crying again, walking down the street in the near dark. For overreacting. For being a stupid teenage girl. But even then she couldn’t be a _normal_ teenage girl. The minute someone gets close to her, starts peeling away at all those protective pieces, she’s taking the easy way out.

She’s such a fucking coward and she swipes angrily at her cheeks. Trying some of the breathing exercises Dr Goode taught her so that she might compose herself before she gets home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **fuck there's gonna be more chapters ******


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **hey hello I'm alive ******

Michael counts each breath as they come. If he can make it through this one, he can make it through another.

Inhale.

Exhale.

A moment passed he will never have to relive.

Each time he turns his head his clock seems stuck on the same numbers. He keeps time instead by the slow hourglass shift of light as it tracks across the ceiling from the streetlights outside.

A steady, dull throb is his accompaniment in the quiet dark of his room. It radiates from his ankles. From his wrists.

There are some nights that he can categorically call _bad_.

It’s been six days since he saw Mallory and six days since he thought about what happened that afternoon. Any creeping remembrance of those hours has him holding his breath, shutting his eyes and chanting to himself _not now, not now, not now._

If only because the memory of how he ruined it threatens to crush him entirely. He doesn’t know if he could survive it.

When Ms Mead found out about his skipped appointment her eyes smoothed over like stones, emotion completely removed and mouth set in a hard line. After his shower she had stopped him in the bathroom door and shoved a bottle of bleach into his chest, he caught it hesitantly against his t-shirt and looked up at her puzzled.

_… Does she want me to finally end this?_

‘If you make another mess, you’re cleaning it up this time.’ She waited for Michael’s shamed nod and watched him back away like a kicked dog.

When the sun starts to rise the urge comes back and he unpeels his bandages from where the dried blood has stuck them to his skin. Sometimes it hurts more than the first act, this prying apart.

He cuffs his school uniform carefully over his limbs and tidies his hair. It’s getting long. He takes a moment to marvel at the idea of it and catches sight of his bible peeking out from his school bag by the door.

That ache seizes in his chest again. The memory of cold gelato on his lips, the way Mallory held his eyes fearlessly, the complete erasure of time and space around them together on that bench. She kept his bible because it was important to him. She wanted to give it back.

Michael strikes a match and holds it to the wick of the black candle on his desk. He folds himself down gingerly, wincing at the hard floor on the hinges of his knees, the bad leg already starting to seize. He lowers his head and clasps his hands and gives into LaVey’s solution to his problems. It feels a little like defeat. A little like salvation.

Blood droplets seep through the fabric of his trousers and he sighs through his prayers.

X

Mallory has been practicing carelessness. Forgetting to brush her teeth in the morning, half doing her hair in a sloppy ponytail instead of her meticulous braid, deliberately not taking her textbook to class and counting up the detention slips she receives.

She’s normally a slave to her rituals, but there’s been many things bothering her since that afternoon with Michael. Doubt keeps her mind open at night to many terrible things. There are only so many intrusive thoughts one can bear before they start losing it. Mallory thinks she’s been patient with herself for long enough.

And so the next morning when she went to her dresser and picked up her thin gold necklace, she nestled it carefully back in the jewellery box and snapped it shut. Her uniform has a modest neckline. Ms Venable would hardly notice if she wasn’t wearing her crucifix, barely seeing her at all during the day as she escaped to the library as soon as school let out.

She doesn’t take anything home, because she’s received enough strange looks from others for the selection she carries to the quiet reading area. Theology, studies of Satanism and histories of black magic and witchcraft. The latter being her latest enthrallment.

Mallory justifies it to herself by saying they’re only stories, even though she begins to see the patterns and archetypes repeating in the more material she consumes. Sometimes it feels like she carries a great secret around with her, a truth that everyone else is ignorant to. It makes her feel triumphant, righteous, yet profoundly lonely. No amount of study is going to save her from this unsolvable sadness.

There’s times when her appointments still overlap with Michael’s, though she hasn’t seen him in the waiting room at all. She thinks that maybe he has stopped coming, which brings a great deal of confusing emotions to her already messed up mind.

One particularly desperate afternoon she stayed on the stairs outside until the doctors came out to close up for the day and found her still waiting. Since then Mallory’s pushed _Michael_ into the tidy little corner of her mind labelled _‘do not think about_ ’.

Exams are approaching at school as the term comes to an end and for science they are growing their own herbs. If they can manage to keep the plants alive in time for their exams, they get extra credit. They are given cute little pots to plant their basic, garden variety herbs in. Ms Montgomery comes by and hands Mallory and Coco a small selection of seeds.

‘This is bullshit. I’m not going to study botany. I’m not even going to be rich enough to own a house to have a garden.’

Mallory sorts through the selection, smiling at Coco’s remark and looking for something inspiring. She thinks over the books she’s read lately of witchcraft, trying to match meanings with the herbs she has.

_Basil_ she remembers, is for a happy home. The scent memory of crushed, fragrant leaves rends her wide open. There’s some buried memory deep in there that has her fingers ripping open the little packet frantically and tipping it into the dirt.

Mallory pats the soil down gently and smiles at the feeling of dirt on her fingers. Coco shoves a random, unopened packet into the soil of her own pot with disgust as the bell rings and she tugs Mallory out with her.

Mallory cradles her little pot as they follow the stream of students out of the building and onto the street. Coco walks quickly and Mallory hurries to keep pace with her longer strides, keeping one ear open to her near-constant rant.

‘I’m never going to need to know anything about stocks and insurance and fucking algebra when the planet is going to be dead in a hot minute anyway.’ Coco said, kicking the pavement with the toe of her oxford. ‘I’m so tired of all this studying. I want to go home and sleep for a year.’

Mallory smiles and voices her agreement, though she feels her blood freeze when she looks up to see the group of students approaching them.

Students in their clean, grey and white uniforms. Hawthorne boys, with their perfect, cultivated genes and air of superiority, grand enough to want to make you expire on the spot in shame.

And to make it even worse, at the back of the group she spies him immediately. Michael is tall, with that particular gait of his walk, that singular shade of his hair, and he’s looking directly back at her. The boys all titter and joke amongst themselves and everyone knows teenage boys are dangerous in a pack, especially Hawthorne boys and their cutting remarks on the Robichaux, public school lowliness. But there’s no avoiding them when they are headed straight towards the two girls.

‘Jesus Christ.’ Coco says under her breath, unconsciously straightening, lifting her chin and walking faster as they make their way past the group, ready to fight back any ridicule with a poisonous tongue. Mallory drops her eyes from Michael's cool, blue gaze and focuses on breathing and taking one step after another to get to the end of the street.

It’s going fine and they’re being safely ignored until the black-haired boy in front of Michael knocks Mallory’s satchel as they pass on the narrow sidewalk. It catches her off balance and she stumbles. The little basil pot flies out of her hands and smashes on the ground.

They’re all silent for a moment, looking down at the ruins of it until the boy who knocked into her starts laughing.

‘Fucking hell, Robichaux. Two left feet or what?’

The boys laugh and she catches Michael smirking along with them when another gangly boy elbows him in good humour. Something cracks in her chest and she feels lower than the dirt on the ground.

‘You’re the clumsy fuckers, look what you did!’ Coco says in abject horror, suddenly coming to the defence of the stupid little gardening assignment because it was Mallory’s and it was important to her. She feels a small bloom of affection for her friend beneath the crushing misery of knowing Michael is just as bad as the rest of them. That he stands at the back of the group of boys and says nothing in the face of her humiliation. Mallory feels his stare along with the other boys and can’t fight the redness in her face and the shaking of her hands. She keeps her eyes fixed on the broken pieces, bending down to gather them slowly.

The boys laugh as they continue walking down the sidewalk, unmoved and unapologetic. Mallory gathers all the shards and stands when Coco starts to tug her arm and pull her away. She murmurs something about having her own pot, joking she doesn’t need the extra credit with her average grade anyway.

Mallory doesn’t look back at the boys down the street, and she doesn’t look for Michael’s eyes on her retreating form. And she certainly won’t wait for him after their appointments ever again.  


End file.
